Experts urge start-ups to develop plan

HCM City (VNA) - Young people should work three to five years at organisations to understand how a business run before starting their own company, delegates said at the Vietnam Young Leaders Forum 2015 held in HCM City on December 18.

Tran Vinh Du, CEO of TNK Capital Partner and Chairman of Vietnam-America Vocational Training College, said people at start-ups should be patient.

"Start-ups usually have limited capital, so you need to prepare detailed plans to call for investors as well as specific plans on what you will do if you receive money from investors," he said.

"I have seen start-ups in Vietnam that did absolutely nothing to prepare before trying to convince investors to fund them," he added.

Many young startups thought that their ideas were excellent and worthwhile, but as speakers at the forum said, ideas contributed only 1 percent to success, while execution represented more than 90 percent of success.

Nguyen Trung Tin, CEO of Trung Thuy Group and Dreamplex's founder, said: "The most important factor to help a start-up project succeed is market opportunities. If you have a good start-up idea but lack good market opportunities, it will be difficult to succeed."

He recommended that young people conduct market research before starting their own businesses.

Organised by the Business Start-up Support Centre in collaboration with the HCM City Young Businesspeople Association and Vietnam Youth Federation in HCM City, the forum attracted the participation of more than 600 young people and company executives.

At the forum, Le Thi Tuong Vy, representative of the Business Start-up Support Centre, encouraged young people to consult the centre about their ideas so they can seek opportunities to convert their projects into reality.-VNA